A joint statement by American and allied intelligence agencies reported that a sophisticated Chinese hacker group has been targeting essential US infrastructure for at least five years.
Volt Typhoon, a known group, has infiltrated the networks of various organizations related to aviation, rail, mass transit, highway, maritime, pipeline, water, and sewage, as reported by the US National Security Agency, US cyber watchdog CISA, the FBI, and the Transportation Security Administration.
The statement did not name any specific organizations, but noted that US intelligence officials had detected the hackers “retaining entry and positions in certain victim IT systems for a minimum of five years.”
The joint statement, endorsed by the cybersecurity organizations of Britain, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, is the most recent in a string of alerts issued by US officials regarding Volt Typhoon. This group has caused concern due to its focus on sabotage rather than espionage.
The prevalence of the cyber attacks has resulted in a succession of discussions between the White House and private technology companies, including telecom and cloud computing firms. The government of the United States requested aid in monitoring the actions.
A high-ranking official from CISA, Eric Goldstein, expressed significant worry regarding the malicious cyber actions of a state-sponsored perpetrator known as Volt Typhoon, attributed to the People’s Republic of China. Goldstein made these comments to Reuters before the official statement was issued. He stated that the majority of the targets identified do not hold any valuable information for espionage purposes.
Source: theguardian.com
